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If the sight of this winter's torrential rains left you pining for a way to capture the precious overflows, you are not alone.
UC Santa Cruz alum Daniel Mountjoy is working to do just that—on a scale that has the potential to ease the state's increasingly persistent cycles of deluge and drought.
The idea is to divert water from overflowing rivers onto fallow farmland, where it seeps into the soil and replenishes depleted aquifers. These "underground reservoirs" function like savings accounts, storing a valued resource for lean times.
"The goal is balance. We want to redirect surplus water, fill underground basins, and have that water available to farmers during drought years," says Mountjoy (BA, environmental studies, 1985), director of resource stewardship at Sustainable Conservation, a San Francisco-based nonprofit focused on solving resource management problems.
Mountjoy sees his role as facilitating a unique coalition—including farmers, environmentalists, academics, and water managers—that is developing and testing the strategy, called "on-farm recharge."
The strategy is in its infancy, but models show it has the capacity to capture enough river water between November and March to offset 20 percent of the annual "overdraft" pumped out of critical areas of the San Joaquin Valley.
Maybe they should follow the example of the ancient people on the Arabian Peninsula and build lots and lots of check dams.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 24 2017, @10:46PM (6 children)
That's exactly what some countries do, large underground cisterns for each house. You can't do this in the USA though thanks to the EPA and other govt interfucktance.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday March 24 2017, @10:49PM (3 children)
Really? Can you please provide a citation?
(I'm not saying that it is not so, I'm saying I'd be grateful for a reference).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Arik on Friday March 24 2017, @11:58PM (2 children)
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday March 25 2017, @12:20AM (1 child)
What the hell is the property of "the person who owns the water drainage" is doing on my property?
Who allowed it there?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Arik on Saturday March 25 2017, @11:00AM
The first settlers that moved into arid areas wound up claiming relatively large amounts of land and working relatively little of it. This may seem wasteful and/or greedy at first glance but in fact it was necessary. You collect water over a large area in order to farm or ranch a small area, there's no other way to do it, water is a scarce commodity in these areas. So maybe the first family of settlers claimed this gigantic area in order to get enough water to run a relatively small operation, and operated like that for years. Then demand for housing reached the area, and the land was sold without the water rights, because the rancher or farmer didn't actually need that land for their operation, other than the water running off it. The buyer agreed to not interfere with that and got a much lower price as a result.
That's oversimplified of course but you get the idea.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday March 25 2017, @12:04AM (1 child)
My old house, in California has a cistern fed by the network of canals and pressurized by a small pump sitting in the backyard. Could drink the tap water without getting sick as well.
Of course, many people even in this state think California is one big San Fagcisco.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bob_super on Saturday March 25 2017, @12:45AM
San Fagsisco on the left coast, New Fascisco on the right coast...